


time doth waste me

by stereokem



Category: Kingsman: The Secret Service (2015)
Genre: Age Difference, Arthurship, Contemplation, FIx It, Getting Older, Harry Hart-Throb, Harry becoming Arthur, Harry pov, Hartwin, M/M, Merlin is extremely perceptive, Navel-Gazing, Pre-Slash, Slow Romance, Some Fluff, Time - Freeform, a smidgen of humor, also more serious, death went dancing, eh, is that a spoiler?, serious fic ends on a happy note, slow-build, some flirtation, subtle flirtation, this is much longer than i intended
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-04
Updated: 2015-04-04
Packaged: 2018-03-21 06:07:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,460
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3680817
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stereokem/pseuds/stereokem
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>[However], a day was a lax measurement. At its core, it was almost entirely arbitrary. Any measurement of time was more or less the same. It described something ephemeral and intangible in quantifiable units, values that could be recorded and plugged into equations. Harry Hart had seen enough to know that time was fickle, tricky and obstinate; it hardly played by the rules except for by accident. It slowed down and sped up as it pleased; it generally marched onward, but there were occasions when it went backward, and even stranger occurrences where it stood completely still.</p><p>Outside a small church in rural Kentucky, Harry Hart felt time come to halt.</p>
            </blockquote>





	time doth waste me

**Author's Note:**

> This was supposed to be sort of a companion piece to "death went dancing", but can definitely be read as stand-alone. Self-edited, all mistakes are mine. Feedback and critique are both very welcome. Cheers.

**(-KM-)**

_Memento mori._

It was what they were taught. Above peace, above security, above job and duty: mortality.

_Memento mori._

Remember death.

 

**(-KM-)**

 

Getting shot was never the same experience. He could recount in chronological order every bullet wound he had ever received (twenty-four total, over the course of an almost thirty-year career); and though each scar was similar in shape, each was also unique. He held a special, begrudging sort of fondness for them, for each of their individual stories and significances. They were badges, in a way, emblems of a life lived, battles fought, victories won. He had been warned about the wounds. He was prepared for them.

What he was not prepared for were the small lines that began to form in the corners of his expressions. He was not prepared for the injuries that took months instead of weeks to heal, nor the weariness after a long reconnaissance assignment, nor the way his hair began to lighten at his temples.

He was prepared to see his comrades around him die, but not to see himself outlive so many of them.

Remember death, they had been told, when they should have been instructed:

 _Remember time_.

 

**(-KM-)**

 

Meeting Gary “Eggsy” Unwin for the second time had made him feel old.

By then, Harry Hart had been an agent for so long that markedly little surprised him anymore; he did, however, feel an appreciable amount of awe when he found himself called upon by the offspring of a fellow Kingsman, fallen more than a decade ago.

He had contemplated the Unwins little since his last meeting with Michele. Grief and reverie had no place in his line of work.

But his memory of faces was eidetic, and when he received notice that his favor to the Unwins was being called in, he pulled up both faces of mother and child immediately: Michele, well made-up but face red and tear-streaked, angry and disconsolate; and the small boy, who sat by himself with his little snow globe, impatiently little fingers and wide green eyes. Harry recalled his own brief smile at the small child, and the feeling of impossibly soft locks beneath his fingers.

The hair was different now, a defiantly grown-out military cut that left the sides short and sharp but the top smooth and thick. The face was also inevitably changed, round cheeks having given way to a strong jawline, eyes no longer wide and watery but bright and wary. It was both difficult and easy to consolidate the two images of the same young man.

He should have simply gotten the boy out of trouble and left him to it. The favor he and Kingsman had given to Michele only extended that far, bore the weight of nothing else. He should have never introduced himself to Eggsy.

But, for a wonder, he had the morning free; and with that much time to himself, he felt he could indulge in his curiosity.

 

**(-KM-)**

 

Seventeen years had passed.

He found himself thinking this as he drank in the small, quiet pub, sitting across the small table from the young man he had just sprung from jail. _Seventeen years_ , he thought as he studied the boy’s face, his cheekbones, his lips, the small and secret little birthmarks that lay inconspicuously against the soft skin of his neck.

That he found himself attracted to the boy was not surprising. He was not ashamed of it, simply acknowledged it for what it was and attempted to push it aside. He had been with many people of both genders, older and younger than himself. He rarely took lovers just for himself—not anymore at least—but he could see taking that route with Eggsy had the circumstances been different.

Whilst he sat at the worn pub table, sipping his Guinness and listening to Eggsy rant, he thought about those circumstances. Perhaps if he had a not just bailed Eggsy out of jail. Had he not known Eggsy’s father. Had Eggsy been older or Harry been younger. He had never really understood the term “gulf of years” until that moment: but it was true, and he saw the vast span of time separating them. As much as age was just a number, it did indeed matter.

But there were parts of his mind (and parts of his body) that didn’t know the difference.

 

**(-KM-)**

 

He offered Eggsy the job for all the good reasons: legacy, recompense, logic, philanthropy. He fully believed the young man was capable, and he wanted to give him something, a tool with which to transform his young life.

But if Harry was honest with himself—and he most often was—he also did it for selfish reasons. He did it because Eggsy intrigued him, and because he wanted to see for himself the full extent of his capability. He did it because he wanted to take the time to get to know Eggsy.

He did it because he felt that he had avoided death for too long, and he would someday soon need a successor.

He did it because the days were slipping through his fingers, and he had no idea where his life was going or if it would be coming back when it walked out the door in the morning.

 

**(-KM-)**

 

However, a day was a lax measurement. At its core, it was almost entirely arbitrary. Any measurement of time was more or less the same. It described something ephemeral and intangible in quantifiable units, values that could be recorded and plugged into equations. Harry Hart had seen enough to know that time was fickle, tricky and antithetical; it hardly played by the rules except for by accident. It slowed down and sped up as it pleased; it generally marched onward, but there were occasions when it went backward, and even stranger occurrences where it stood completely still.

Outside a small church in rural Kentucky, Harry Hart felt time come to halt.

The barrel of the gun that positioned itself towards his skull was nothing novel. He felt no fear of it, only felt its energy, as if the electrons and protons of which it was made were buzzing tangibly in his periphery. Death was an old friend. Even before the trigger was pulled, he could already begin to feel the blood slow and cool to a slow sludge in his veins.

He would have gone then willingly; but he had forgotten that there were people with him, not there in the moment but at different places and in different timezones halfway around the globe. He had forgotten that there was a young man sitting in his study in his quiet London flat, watching everything with wide green eyes.

(Neither of them knew it then, but time, by some cruel trick, had altered its tempo so that their heartbeats were synchronized for a full twenty seconds).

_“Harry—!”_

And blackness.

 

**(-KM-)**

 

 _Remember death,_ his father, distant and ghostly, had told him.

Blood pumped itself sluggishly through his limbs, sloughing along at a worm’s unhurried pace through the loose, damp earth. 

_Remember, time._

**(-KM-)**

Two months passed before he awoke.

He had spent more time than that recovering in medical before, but this time was different. He felt wronged; cheated somehow.  

It was a bit dramatic of him—maybe more than a bit; but, to be fair, his entire life was a bit dramatic, despite the covertness of his affairs. Getting shot in the head was _certainly_ dramatic, so much that surviving it made him feel faintly ridiculous.

Maybe not as ridiculous as the punk haircut medical had given him in order to properly dress the wound. God, he’d been a sight: half of his skull shaved into barely more than a buzzcut, while the other half had been allowed to grow long and unkempt whilst he slept away in his medically-induced restorative coma.

Eggsy for one, who had bounded into medical the moment he heard Harry was awake (having abruptly abandoned a field training course, judging by the amount of mud on his boots and trousers), was very appreciative.

“Oi, wicked bob,” he said appraisingly, as if he hadn’t seen it before, as if he hadn’t been keeping daily vigil right here beside Harry’s bed in his every spare moment. He reached up and, without asking, ran his fingers lightly along the crest of Harry’s shaven skull.

(Neither of them knew it, but it’s the first of many times Eggsy will touch him without asking, without needing to. It gives him the same small shiver every time.)

           

**(-KM-)**

 

Regimes could fall in a day. Governments could be overthrown in the span of hours. He had spent the past two months sleeping away; there was a lot to catch up on.

Thus, the next few days were spent in a flurry of debriefings, separated by lull periods during which he read international newspapers—or talked to Eggsy, who seemed to take every opportunity to hustle into the infirm to which Harry was still confined. In addition to being a wealth of information on the current climate internationally and within Kingsman, the young man had a penchant for narrating and story-telling. Harry found that he quite enjoyed Eggsy’s elaborate re-tellings of the cut-and-dry mission reports that Harry had been given to peruse.

“It was madness, Harry,” Eggsy said, his green eyes gleaming with the memory as he leaned forward in the infirm chair. “Thank ‘oly fuck for Gawain, or I’d prob’ly ‘ave bled out. Left a nasty scar.” Even as he said it, though, he winked and grinned, tapping just above his left hip where the wound supposedly lay.

Well, not supposedly: Harry new full well exactly where the blade had punctured the flesh and dragged a short but deep line across smooth skin. He knew because, in addition to reading up on organizational advancements and international goings-on, he had also reviewed the three assignments that Eggsy had undertaken in the two short months of Harry’s convalescence. He had read them, and re-read them, watched the visio-feed, and memorized the medical reports for the agent whose codename was now Galahad.

And that was a whole other can of worms. Eggsy had been given the title just after the Valentine fiasco, when it was apparent that Harry would not be waking up for a while. Knighting was not something Kingsman took lightly; if Eggsy had been made Galahad, it meant that Harry would never hold that title again.

Which meant that he had either outlived his usefulness, or. . . .

“You know they want t'make you Arthur.”

It wasn’t quite a question, but it had that same note of uncertainty. No one had spoken to Harry about it since he had woken up, except to say that Merlin was acting _pro tempore_ —and disliking it intensely, though doing a decent job.

But Harry knew.

“Ah. The Kiss of Death,” he said wryly.

Eggsy, sitting back slightly in his chair, reached down to scratch JB behind the ears. He kept his eyes on Harry however.

“You don’t 'ave to, you know,” came Eggsy’s voice, and Harry watched the way he stroked the delicate juncture between floppy puppy ear and small furry skull.

Harry made a sound that he had intended to be a huff, but came out sounding like something a little more breathless.

“Don’t be ridiculous.”

 

**(-KM-)**

 

When a bullet comes toward you, it travels both slow and fast. Slow enough that you can linger in denial of its arrival; and then so fast that you are wounded before you hear the sound it makes leaving the barrel.

Harry Hart wasn’t a romantic man; but if he was, he might say the same thing about love.

 

**(-KM-)**

 

Due to his condition and the tenuous nature of his head-wound, he stayed on base for another few weeks after waking. He was allowed to leave the infirm but required to stay in somewhat close proximity (just as a precaution, he was told, just until he was “in the clear”). He was a lent a temporary guest room in the main barracks, though he seldom retired there except to sleep.

He found it disconcerting to be in headquarters and to not, for once, be a part of the bustle that was Kingsman. There was a desire to make himself useful. So, even though he was not technically cleared for any kind of duty, he found himself often in the company of Merlin who, while acting as interim Arthur, was also maintaining the duties of his official title of magician, and who was very appreciative of Harry’s presence and strictly unofficial advice.

“You should be doing this,” said Merlin, flipping with slight peevishness through a stack of paper—probably a departmental report from tech, judging by the way his eerie eyes narrowed in distaste.

Harry, sitting across the room in a comfortable chair with a laptop in his lap, glanced up.

“You are not the only one who thinks so,” he said simply after a pause.

Merlin gave a snort that sounded more angry than anything and rounded his gaze on Harry. “Will you accept?” he demanded flatly.

Harry closed his laptop carefully and considered the irritable focus that was being directed his way. This was one of the things that appealed to him about Merlin: he could be sly and downright disingenuous when needed, but he favored being blunt and having matters out in the open. He had little patience for dancing around subjects or wording things to accommodate delicate sensibilities.

“As you know, I have not been officially offered the position,” Harry returned evenly.

“Formality,” Merlin countered. “The job is yours and you know it. You would be superb at it. And if you don’t take it from me soon, I am fixing to run this organization into the ground.”

“You are doing fine.”

“I am doing _two_ jobs, and something is holding you back from taking one of them. What is it?”

Looking from Merlin to the slice of daylight visible through the curtained window of the office, Harry reached for the glass of water sitting on the desk beside him; he took a drink, eyes taking in the sunlight that made the red drapes shine like warm, hot blood.

 _It_ had been weighing on Harry’s mind for a while now. From the moment he found himself waking up—impossibly—from a head-wound that should have, by all accounts, killed him. From that first foray back into consciousness, the thought had formed in his mind, gaining weight and traction in his psyche day by day.

“I always thought I would die in the field.”

“Every Knight on active duty thinks that. You _wanted_ to die in the field.”

At this, Harry felt obligated to shoot him a look, because _really._ “I am not suicidal, Merlin.”

“No, but you are a Greek: you wanted to go out in a blaze of glory. You never wanted to become Chester. You never liked him, but you liked him even less when he became Arthur.”

“I saw what it did to him—”

“It did nothing to him. He was already a greedy, classist bigot; becoming Arthur simply gave him an undue amount of power to exercise those qualities,” said Merlin, delivering the comment without an iota of ill-intent, just as very matter-of-fact statement. “You are none of those things. Frankly, you would be a bloody blessing for this organization as Arthur. I cannot think of a more capable or progressive mind to bring us out of the dark ages that Chester seemed to be content to fester in.”

“It isn’t as though I am _not_ going to take the job,” Harry admitted in a low, subdued tone. “But I have been on active field duty for the past thirty years—“ _god, that long?_ He could remember his first mission as if it had happened last week. _Where had his life gone?_ – “I can’t simply switch that part of myself off.”

“It will be a process,” Merlin agreed. “But I am sure—”

Just then, the door to Merlin’s office burst open, and who should stride through but the newest member of the knighthood, dressed to the nines in a cobalt-blue, pin-striped Kingsman-tailored suit, his ensemble completed by a very broad grin.

“Harry!” he exclaimed, taking several steps into the room before actually comprehending Harry’s expression, and coming to a sharp halt. His grin dropped off, and his face went just the tiniest bit pink. “Oh, shit, sorry, 'old on—”

Harry and Merlin both watched silently as Eggsy turned heel and went back through the door, closing it behind him. There was a pause, and then a very sharp rap, as of someone tapping their knuckles on the wood.

Merlin closed his laptop, folded his arms, and rolled his eyes. “Come in, Galahad,” he drawled.

Once again, the door swung open to reveal Eggsy. He sauntered in, holding out his arms in an exaggerated welcome. “Haaa-rryy!” he exclaimed, drawing the name out. He walked up to the armchair where Harry was sitting, and companionably clasped a hand down on Harry’s shoulder. He beamed down at Harry (who was fighting to look unamused) and then turned his gaze to Merlin (whose lack of amusement was more successfully displayed).

“Merlin,” he said, nodding respectfully. “I was wondering if I might steal Harry for a bit. I’d like to take 'im to lunch.”

Merlin blinked, eerily still eyes taking in Eggsy without expression. “Are you not supposed to be in Madrid?”

“Tomorrow,” both Eggsy and Harry responded at the same time.  

Merlin raised an eyebrow, looking between them both. Harry, despite having known Merlin for literally years, and being a full grown man with enough experience to not feel abashed about anything, felt himself becoming just a touch uncomfortable under that gaze. His situation was not aided by Eggsy’s hand, which was still resting on his shoulder, the touch distracting Harry more than it should.

Finally, Merlin nodded. “I don’t see why not.”

Harry could positively feel the radiance emanating from Eggsy’s being as he beamed at Merlin; the hand on his shoulder tightened just a hair.

“Excellent!” He removed his hand from Harry’s shoulder, extending it down to him, as if to help him up. “Sir?”

Suppressing a grin of his own by hiding it behind a grimace, Harry batted Eggsy’s hand away and stood from his chair. “Sod off,” he said, stepping past Eggsy and walking out of the office.

 

**(-KM-)**

 

He had wished for more time before.

It was always a superficial wish: more time to dodge a bullet, to diffuse a bomb, to crack a security system. More time to reload his weapon or contemplate alternative strategies before simply going with his gut instinct, the reflexive quickness of his reptile brain.

He had wished for more time before; but never like this.

He watched Eggsy, who was sitting across the small café table from him, waving his arms expansively and relating a recent assignment he had been on with Lancelot. He watched, and took in everything: Eggsy’s strong jawline, the way his lips curled in enthusiasm, the slight winking of his eye that seemed like a twitch but also seemed like flirtation. He watched Eggsy, and he found himself wishing that he could slow time down, just enough to let him enjoy this.

He wanted to lean across the table, take Eggsy’s tie in his hand, and bring him close to kiss him. He wanted to feel what those young, plush lips would be like. He wanted to bridge that gulf of years and formalities between them, to kiss Eggsy slow and filthy as he knew how. He wanted time to suck and lick each little mole on Eggsy’s body. He wanted to know every place Eggsy had ever had a bruise, a cut, a wound, and learn the history beneath his skin, so much shorter than Harry’s.

He wanted the time.

But he couldn’t. It was called a “gulf” of years because it is too large an expanse to build a bridge over; and time, ever obstinate and contrary to human desires, did not lend itself to him. Instead, it seemed to speed up, and before he knew it, lunch was over and Eggsy was accepting the check from the waiter.

Less than fifteen hours later, Eggsy was on a flight to Madrid, and Harry was left sitting in his temporary room at headquarters, staring up at the ceiling and wondering how the night became so long.  

           

**(-KM-)**

 

He was fully discharged from medical the same day that he formally accepted the title of Arthur.

All of the paperwork to make his promotion official had been drawn up while he was still laying comatose. There was obviously no doubt in anyone’s mind that he would indeed take the position. Once the contracts had been signed, there was a small ceremony of sorts held via conference call. All of the knights re-affirmed their approval of his “coronation”. Only Merlin, Lancelot, Percival, and Gawain were all there in the flesh, Galahad still being on assignment in Madrid. Each knight gave their salute to him in turn. Lancelot nodded at him with the smallest of smiles; Merlin, beneath his thickly-caked mask of stoicism, looked relieved. Eggsy simply regarded him quietly, expression professional and respectful.

After the meeting concluded, he excused himself to infirm one final time to sign a few remaining release forms. He was just about to walk out of the infirm when his cell rang.

He looked at the caller ID, and answered on the third ring.

_“Hello, Arthur.”_

He curled a lip, hearing the cheek in Eggsy’s voice. “Hello, Galahad.”

_“So, congratulations are in order, yeah? What's your big celebratory move now that you’ve gone an' won the golden ticket?”_

Harry gave one last nod to the chief of medical before heading out the doors and walking down the hallway. “Going bloody well home,” he responded.

On the other end of the line, Eggsy barked out a laugh. _“Moving out of HQ, then?”_

“It is about time, don’t you think?”

_“Suppose so. Though JB and I will miss you.”_

There was something odd about Eggsy’s voice then. He still sounded like the cocky, self-assured young man Harry was accustomed to speaking with; but there was something almost vulnerable in his tone, almost as if he was refraining from saying something.

Reaching the garage, Harry pulled out his car keys. “I am not disappearing off the face of the earth,” he pointed out.

_“Nawh, but . . . I liked ‘aving you wiv’in arm’s reach all the time.”_

The words were tumbling forth from his lips before he could think twice or consider the consequences:

“You know where I live,” he said, and he could feel a slight rush of adrenaline as he did so. “You are free to stop by anytime.”

There was a pause on the other end of the line, and it seemed as though Eggsy might not respond. Something like fear coiled tightly in Harry’s gut as he pressed the phone to his ear, straining to listen, more than anything needing a response.

And it came, in a voice that was warm and low and several time-zones away.

_“Count on it, Harry. Count on it.”_

 

**(-KM-)**

 

In the field, a Kingsman remains aware of everything. His surroundings, his arsenal, his strength, his wounds, his objective, his heartrate, his chances of survival. Everything.

Everything, that is, but his age.

Now: now that he would no longer be in the field, now that he would likely never be given an assignment again . . . his age was all he could think about.

It weighed down on him. The years he had spent running for his life, fighting so that the world could be a more peaceful, safer place. He had given up his youth to Kingsman. He had never regretted it until now.

Death was no longer an imminent part of his every day, but it was there. Lingering in the background. It was as if he had developed a cancerous melanoma, one that would not kill him for a while but would creep up on him slowly, robbing him of strength and vigor and everything that had kept him alive all these years.

He walked up the stairs to the front door of his flat, and realized that he would someday see an age where even something as simple as this would be a struggle.

And, all at once, all of a sudden, he felt an overwhelming sense of loss. It hit him like a wave, sickening and jarring. He felt as if he had been cheated, as if he had cheated himself.

Merlin was perfectly right. He was not suicidal: but he desperately wished to die in battle.

He had not anticipated growing old.

Laggardly, he unlocked the door and stepped into his long-unused flat. It smelled clean, if faintly dusty. Even without turning on the lights, he could see that nothing had been moved from its place.

There was an old grandfather clock in the entry way, and it ticked to itself contentedly. It was, Harry noticed, an hour ahead; it had not been set back for daylight savings.

Carefully, he set his keys down on a nearby table, and opened the face of the clock. He reached in and placed his index finger on the minute-hand, turning it widdershins until it read the correct hour.

He had just closed the clock again when there was a knock on his door. 

Bewildered, he turned around and stared at the stolid wood. Slowly, he walked up to it and closed one eye to look through the peephole at the person on the other side:

Something heavy and warm dropped into his stomach, and it almost felt as if the breath had left him. 

“I thought you were in Madrid,” was the most he managed to say as he opened the door.

Eggsy gave a small shrug of his shoulders. He was dressed casually now, black slacks and white button-up shirt under a grey cotton blazer. His hair was ruffled, and he looked the slightest bit tired, though his green eyes shone brilliantly as he smiled.

“Jus' got off the plane, actually,” he replied, stepping into the doorway and into Harry’s space. He smelled, for lack of a better word, warm. And slightly musky.

Harry was silent, listening to his heart beat as he looked down into Eggsy’s face, not trusting himself to speak and not knowing what to say if he did.

“Look,” Eggsy said finally, gaze flicking down once before resurfacing to look Harry in the eye. “I know this is forward an’ol, but as me mum says, ‘ain’t no present like the time’. What are you doing this evening?”

 

**(-KM-)**

 

**Author's Note:**

> I do promise that I am writing some Kingsman stuff that isn't serious. I've got a smutfic in the works, and a funny one. :)
> 
> A little further explanation of this fic:  
> So, we're all perfectly aware of it, even though it doesn't get discussed much in the fandom: there is a very large age gap between Harry and Eggsy. I think it's extremely sexy, but also sort of problematic. I personally have always been attracted to people who are significantly older than myself, and I wanted to address the age difference from the perspective of the older party.


End file.
